Chapter 17
Dear July,
Please don’t be mad at me. Please. I would never have left you if I had any choice.
Joe
When I was sixteen, everything about the lake seemed magical to me because of its association with July. The glittering water that grew colder when we dived deeper. The rich, layered greens of the trees over us where we lay on my old blanket, the undergrowth privacy-screening our clearing. That scent of sweet Carolina air I’ve never found anywhere else in the world.
Then I came back and had my hastily resurrected dreams sexorcised right out of me, and the lake became my solitary refuge. A place older than me and my mistakes. A place where maybe, if I’m patient and look hard enough and don’t get distracted by the memory and feel of July, some wisdom and peace might seep into me.
But today I’ve just gotten to our—my—rock when I hear shouting and a girl scream, and any remaining magic shatters. All that’s left is the sound of my heart and breath ragged in my ears, my feet pounding over the roots and ruts of the trail down to the cabins, and when I burst into the clearing and see two guys, one with his hand on Maisie, and Sam doubled over holding his gut… I’m gonna kill that motherfucker. Rage distorts my vision as I dive straight at the guy, catching him in the solar plexus with my shoulder, taking him down and landing on top of him hard…
***
“She’s on her way.” I slide my phone back into my pocket.
Everybody nods.
Birdsong has started back up farther into the woods, but here, where I wait with the kids and a mirrored-glasses sheriff’s deputy, it’s quiet. None of the other cabins show any sign of life. A half-full laundry basket sits in the grass near us, a few T-shirts pinned to Maisie’s clothesline above it. She’s pale and shaking, her eyes huge, her thin arms wrapped around Sam. He’s holding on to her too, looking a little less green than a few minutes ago, just rocking her and staring beyond me to where another deputy has the kid who grabbed Maisie handcuffed in the back of a cruiser.
At first it wasn’t clear who they were going to cuff.
“Where’d Willard go?” Sam’s voice is hoarse. There’s murder in it.
The deputy near us perks up. “Who’s Willard?”
“The other asshole. Curt’s friend. He was here too, till Joe tackled Curt. I didn’t see where he went after that.” Sam rubs circles on Maisie’s back.
Our deputy waves over a third officer, a woman, and speaks too low for me to hear. She nods, goes over to the cruiser, and says something quietly to that deputy.
July’s little car wheels into the circle of cabins with a spray of gravel. She must’ve broken a land-speed record to get here this fast. Everyone, including the deputies, turns to look. I don’t think it’s my imagination that we all take in a deep, relieved breath. Swear to god, some of the birds start singing again in the trees around us.
My desire to laugh is entirely inappropriate.
She’s out of the car, still wearing her apron, reaching for Maisie and Sam before anyone can even greet her. “Y’all okay?”
They nod and she turns to the deputy without taking her arms from around them. “Hey, Cade. What’s going on? Can I help in some way?”
“July. Mr., uh”—he consults his notes, jerking his head at me—“Anderson here suggested we have you come up. We need to talk to these three”—he nods at Sam, Maisie and me—“separately, and he thought you should be here for the kids, since their folks aren’t here.”
July’s eyebrows raise and her eyes find mine for the first time. “Okay, sure.”
She stays with Maisie. The woman deputy comes over to talk with them. Cade seats Sam on the steps of the cabin next door, and they wait, silently, for July to finish with Maisie. The third deputy waves me over to the cabin nearest the cruiser.
He leads with, “Kid says you beat him up pretty bad.”
“What? No. Not true. I tackled him and told Maisie to call 9-1-1. I held him down while we waited for you all to get here. Never hit him.” I’m telling the truth—the miraculous goddamn truth because my fingers still itch to pound him, to close around his throat and squeeze—but sweat prickles at my back anyway. I hated my dad, but his message about police not being our friends must’ve stuck. I’m a newcomer—still mostly a stranger—in a small town, an adult who tackled a minor. At least I assume he’s still a minor, despite him having a couple of inches and at least thirty pounds on me.
“Okay, why don’t you tell me from the beginning? What were you doing up here anyway?”
I tell him about going for a run up to the picnic spot, hearing yelling, and coming down to see what was going on.
“Why’d you care enough to come see?”
I tell him about what Maisie had told us at the restaurant the other day. “I didn’t know if it was them I heard yelling, but I had to make sure they were okay.”
“And when you saw them, you hit the Curt kid, knocked him down, and pinned him?”
“No.” I keep my breathing slow, my tone quiet. “I didn’t hit him. I was still running. I tackled him to the ground and held him there.”
He nods, takes down my contact information, finds a few more ways to try to get me to admit to hitting Curt, and when I correct him each time, he finally seems satisfied. “All right. Stick around till we’re done with these kids, okay, in case we have more questions.”
I lower myself to the porch steps and watch as he approaches July and Maisie and their deputy. July seems to be just listening, close by Maisie’s side but letting her stand on her own. Maisie’s hugging herself, her hands holding her elbows. Her face is pale and serious. I can see her mouth moving, but she’s speaking too softly for me to hear anything.
I glance over to the next cabin at Sam. He’s looking at me. I give him a nod I hope is reassuring and he nods back. I think he’ll be okay.
The kid I tackled is still in the back of the squad car, his head tilted back against the seat, not moving. Yeah, you just sit there and pray, asshole, and rethink your life.
My eyes are drawn back to July. She’s steady as a rock beside Maisie, posture alert and easy, arms by her sides, sunlight dappling her hair and shirt, her pretty face calm as she listens. She’s taken off the apron and tossed it across her shoulder. Her blue T-shirt is snug across her chest.
In a flash I’m back in her apartment on her sofa, moving in her, her bare breasts full and soft and pale in the early morning light, her eyes on mine, heavy-lidded, satisfied, and I’m…twenty years too late.
I have to blink away to remind myself where I am.
July doesn’t speak, doesn’t try to do anything, but Maisie and Sam look less scared just having her here.
I feel better too. I don’t know whether we’re friends exactly, but she’s a hell of an ally.
When the deputies finish with Maisie, July catches my eye, raises her brows, and I know just what she’s asking. I nod and make my way over to sit with Maisie on her steps while July goes with the deputies to talk with Sam.
“How you holding up?”
“Okay.” Maisie glances at the cruiser where the Curt kid still waits. A tiny shudder ripples through her.
He’s too far away to see it, but I’m not. I stretch and get to my feet, “accidentally” moving between her and the car so Curt won’t be able to see her.
Her eyes shift to me. “What do you think they’re asking Sam?”
I shrug, shaking out my hands and arms. “Probably the same stuff they asked you. What happened, who did what.”
“Are we going to be in trouble?” Her voice is tiny.
“What? No! Why would you be in trouble?”
Her turn to shrug. “It just feels…weird. I’ve never had to talk to the police before. It feels…bad. Like if I wasn’t doing anything wrong, I shouldn’t have had to.”
I nod. “Yeah. I kinda felt that way too.”
“You did?” There’s surprise in her eyes. Maybe even a hint of a smile.
“Yeah.”
“That was great, what you did.” Her eyes are solemn again. Huge in her face.
I don’t know what to say to that.
“Come on. Show me how to hang laundry,” I tell her finally.
She laughs, but she climbs to her feet and leads me over to her abandoned clothes basket.
***
July
Sam’s story is nearly identical to Maisie’s. I listen with one ear as I watch Joe with Maisie. He’s helping her hang the wet laundry for heaven’s sake. I can tell he’s purposely picking socks and towels, and looking away as she hastily scoops up the underwear and hangs it behind a sheet. What a funny, kind, sensitive guy.
Sam says, just as Maisie did, that Curt had punched him, “and then Joe came flying down off the trail and tackled him.” To hear them tell it, you wouldn’t think Joe’s feet even touched the ground. “And he bent Curt’s arms up behind his back and told Maisie to dial 9-1-1. And he just…held Curt down and asked me if I was okay.”
The deputies have a few more questions for Sam. Nothing I haven’t already heard until they ask for his contact information.
“This is the best place to find me. I’m…pretty much always here when I’m not at school or working at July’s.” His voice has gone quieter.
No mention of when Maisie’s mom is gone. Just “always here.”
The deputies ask about the kids’ jobs with me. I say they’ll be full-time starting next week. They nod, tell us how to request a copy of the police report, and then as they head toward the squad car, Joe intercepts Ginny, the deputy who questioned Maisie. I hear him say quietly, “Can you get somebody to tow Curt’s car so Maisie and Sam don’t have to look at it, and so he and his buddies don’t have any excuse to come back up here?”
I hadn’t noticed the old Toyota on the other side of the squad car, but Joe had and thought ahead to solve a problem before it even arose.
Ginny looks Joe over and nods. “Yeah, we can do that.”
The kids and Joe and I stand and watch as the deputies leave with the Curt boy.
“Y’all okay?” I ask the three of them, just as Joe says to the kids, “You two doing okay?”
Our laughter doesn’t quite break the tension.
“Come on.” I nod at the empty laundry basket under Maisie’s arm. “Put that inside and lock up. Everybody in the car. We’re going for a drive.” I glance at Joe. “That means you too.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“You there, Mr. Hero,” I say when we’re on the road, Joe beside me, his seat pulled forward to give the kids more room, his tanned knee right near my gear shift. “You find some good music. And, y’all…” I meet Sam and Maisie’s eyes in the rearview mirror. “It’s your job to groan and gripe about whatever the old man picks.”
They play along like I’ve been bossing them around their whole lives, Joe trying station after station, song after song, the kids booing each one. Finally he finds “I Won’t Give Up” and nobody hisses. In fact, from the back seat comes quiet singing.
“Oh, come on.” Joe twists around to glare at them. “ Really ?”
“It’s a good song!” Maisie says it. Sam nods.
“How do you all even know Jason Mraz?” Joe’s cranky that they didn’t like his Red Hot Chili Peppers, I can tell.
“There’s a K-pop group that sings it too.”
Before they can argue anymore, I turn the volume up, and then we’re barreling down country roads into Spartanburg County, belting out the lyrics at the top of our not-always-on-key voices. It’s cathartic.
Just north of Spartanburg, I turn east to take us to a farm-store diner Andi and I discovered a few years ago. They serve the biggest, greasiest plates of food you can imagine, and they finish you off with homemade pie and ice cream.
We order burgers and fries and a big plate of onion rings to share.
“Your stomach okay?” Some of the worry has crept back onto Maisie’s face as she turns to Sam.
He pats his belly. “Yeah. I’ll probably have a bruise, but my guts are fine.”
Maisie frees her silverware from her napkin and then looks from Joe to me. “What do you think’s going to happen with Curt and the police?”
Joe raises his brows at me in a silent You take it.
“I don’t know the exact steps. I think they’ll take him to the police station and charge him. Decide whether to let him out on bail. His family or somebody will have to take care of that to get him out, I think.”
Sam leans forward, elbows on the table, twisting a straw wrapper in his hands. “What do you think they’ll charge him with?”
I shrug. “Probably assault for hitting you? Maybe something like attempted kidnapping for trying to make Maisie go with him? I don’t know much about this stuff.”
Joe says quietly, “They’re probably going to look for the Willard kid. Question him. He might be charged with something too, depending on what all he knew about Curt’s plans.”
Maisie and Sam share a look and go silent.
“A judge will probably order them both to stay away from y’all.” I know this much from the women at work. What I don’t know is whether those boys will have the sense to listen.
Maisie nods.
“Your mom going to be home soon? How late does she work?” Joe is, once again, thinking ahead.
Maisie exchanges another glance with Sam. “I don’t think she’ll get home until tomorrow.”
“You should call her right away. Ginny—the deputy, remember?—is expecting your mom to call her as soon as possible.” I don’t understand why Maisie doesn’t seem to get how important this is.
She sinks down in her chair a little. “I’ll call her when we get back to the cabin. It’s…sometimes it’s hard to reach her. She’s in meetings a lot.”
“Let me know if you want me to be there when you call, okay? However you want to do it is fine. You just have to do it soon.” I stop there. Any more will push her away, I’m pretty sure.
Maisie nods.
I’m glad Joe speaks next because I don’t know what else to say. That rarely happens.
“Anybody ever teach you all self-defense?” Joe looks from Maisie to Sam.
He tells them about some good online videos and sources of information. It’s a great subject change, really, to get them thinking about what they can do rather than all the things they’ve got no control over.
I lean back and listen. He asks them questions, some serious, some silly, and tells them good tips mixed with funny stories. They listen and smile and, eventually, laugh.
The server brings our food. It’s hot and fresh and delicious, the fries thin and crispy just the way I like, but I can barely swallow past the lump in my throat.
How many of these things does Joe know because he had to learn how to defend himself and his mom from his dad?
This Joe looks tougher—harder and lean rather than skinny—than young Joe. There are faint lines at the corners of his eyes. From laughter, I hope. His thoughtfulness and sweetness are still there, his gentleness in full evidence as he talks to these two traumatized kids.
I think about excusing myself to go to the restroom. Maybe lock myself in a stall and have a good long cry about all three of them. About the resilience of youth, and the strength of kindness and hope. And selfishly, about all I lost when I hurt this amazing man.
But I don’t want to leave them for a second. So I sit and listen and smile at appropriate moments. I sip my tea and force down tiny bits of my food and watch them.
And after they’ve finished their burgers, and Joe and Sam are arguing about which kind of pie sounds best, I see Maisie gazing from one of them to the other. First at Sam’s face, then his stomach. Then at Joe. And when she turns those big, scared eyes on me, I know she’s wondering what would have happened to her today if Sam and Joe hadn’t been there. Hadn’t been such good guys. Hadn’t put themselves in harm’s way sticking up for her.
“I think,” I cut in, interrupting their good-natured squabbling, “you both deserve as much pie as you want.” I meet the bemused server’s eyes. “Bring us two of everything, please. And a whole lot of forks.”
And Maisie’s wobbly smile across the table about breaks my heart.